OASIS Groups to Tackle Utility Computing

Standards body OASIS has made good on its plans to develop the Data Center
Markup Language (DCML), setting up four technical committees to foster
utility computing standards.

The DCML is a language that prescribes schemas for how servers, networks,
applications and services can corral siloed data in an automated, on-demand
fashion. Improving data center performance is a central theme for
next-generation computing architectures at a time when customers are looking
to simplify their infrastructure and cut costs.

Accordingly, OASIS has split up the DCML group into the OASIS DCML Framework
Technical Committee, the OASIS DCML Server Technical Committee, the OASIS
DCML Network Technical Committee and the OASIS DCML Applications and
Services Technical Committee. Each group will hash out standards pertaining
to its focus area.

The work is a significant boost to DCML. When EDS , Computer
Associates , Opsware
and others forged
the DCML group last year it was believed they might struggle to advance
their interests.

Analysts said the lack of participation or support from IBM , HP , Sun Microsystems
and other companies looking to hatch their own utility
or on-demand computing plans could thwart the effort.

But OASIS bailed out the DCML group when it agreed to
host and develop the specification. There remains a whiff of competition.
Members of IBM and Veritas last February started
their own Utility Computing Working Group under the aegis of the Distributed
Management Task Force.

Going forward, members of the Framework Technical Committee will work on improving the
broad DCML spec, currently in version 1.0. The Applications and Services
Technical Committee will create a uniform data model and interchange format to allow
application components, such as Web services, to be referenced and managed.

The Network Technical Committee will design a data model and XML-based format for
exchanging information about networking elements in the data center,
including simple switching and routing elements and advanced nodes process
at all layers of the protocol stack.

The Server Technical Committee will facilitate the interchange of information between
tools and devices, increasing automation in the data center, which is one of
the primary focuses of the DCML.